About the city of God

Apology of the Blessed One Aurelius Augustine's “On the City of God” (22 books) was written in 413-426. This is an answer to the pagans, who saw the reason for the destruction of Rome by the Visigoths in the fact that the Christian God could not supposedly protect the Eternal City, guarded since ancient times by the Roman gods. In their opinion, the misfortunes happened at the will of the gods, offended by the spread of the new religion. One of the themes of the book is the fight against heresies. Blzh. Augustine justifies repressive measures against heretics and forced conversion to Christianity. The apology consists of 2 parts: apologetic (books I-X) and doctrinal (books XI-XXII). Books I-V refute superstitious beliefs about pagan gods. Books VI-X contain polemics with pagan philosophers about monotheism and polytheism, fortune-telling and prophecies, angels and demons, etc. Books XI-XIV discuss how the city of God and the city of earth were born. Books XV-XVIII examine their growth and development. In books XIX-XXII - their final destination. The essay begins with a criticism of Roman customs and pagan religious and philosophical ideas. Blzh. Augustine emphasizes that the pagan gods were not particularly favorable to the Romans and did not care at all about morality. He calls the beginning of sin not the flesh, but the evil will, which is guided by pride. Blzh. Augustine argues that the state is based on the idea of ​​justice, without which it turns into a “band of robbers.” In politics, he distinguishes a triad: family – city – state. The cause of interhuman strife is the difference in languages. The author develops his own historiosophical concept: history represents the progressive movement of humanity, consisting of 2 city-states: the City of God (angels and people chosen by the grace of God) and the city of the devil (demons and unrepentant sinners). Some are destined to “reign forever with God,” while others are “destined to endure eternal punishment with the devil.” The first representatives of the City of God and the city of the devil on earth are Abel and Cain. 6 periods of the historical life of mankind (from Adam to Noah, from the flood to Abraham, from Abraham to David, from David to the Babylonian captivity, from captivity to the Coming of Christ, from Christ to the end of the world) correspond to 6 days of creation. The principles of a righteous life are indicated in the Old Testament, and with the appearance of Christ they are concentrated in the Church, which keeps His covenants for all mankind. Blzh. Augustine decisively rejects the “co-eternity” of creation with the Creator. During “this age” the City of God and the city of the devil are completely indistinguishable and exist in confusion. They will be distinguished and separated only during the Last Judgment. According to blzh. Augustine, all kingdoms, including the Roman Empire, are governed by the Providence of God (Book V). States created by human efforts are doomed to destruction. The disasters that befall people are useful because they indicate where to seek salvation. Blzh. Augustine condemns the chiliasts. The Kingdom of Christ is the present Church. The first resurrection of the dead, which is spoken of in the Apocalypse, is nothing more than a spiritual resurrection (Book XX). *The title of the work in Latin is De civitate Dei ad Marcellinum. • The work of St. Augustine “De Civitate Dei” as an apology for Christianity in its struggle against Roman paganism prof. M.Ya. Krasin • The doctrine of the Kingdom of God according to the work of Blessed Augustine “On the City of God” by holy confessor Ambrose (Polyansky) The publication “On the City of God” in the ABC of Faith library is based on the text of the “modern edition” 1, which turned out to be available on several sites 2 in the same form - with a large number of recognition errors, a number of omissions (whole chapters!) and without indicating who worked on the digitization. We have corrected the text according to the edition of “Aletheia”. In addition, references to Scripture and to ancient writers were checked with the Kyiv edition of the early 20th century 3 (in which another translation 4 and quotations from Scripture are given in Church Slavonic). Discrepancies were resolved according to the Latin original (usually in favor of the Kyiv edition) and noted in the notes. Aug. 18:45: Therefore, following as best I could the example of the apostles, who cited prophetic testimonies from both, that is, from both the Jewish codes and the Seventy, I, for my part, considered it necessary to use the authority of both, since the authority of both is the same and divine. From the same pre-revolutionary edition, for the convenience of the reader, texts introducing books (petitoma) and chapters have been added, and numerous omissions of text in the edition of “Aletheia” have been filled in. In those quite many cases when a quotation from Scripture according to the Synodal translation does not confirm the thought of St. Augustine (which was most often commented on by the editor), we have restored the quotations from the Church Slavonic text and removed the notes that had immediately become unnecessary. Such quotes differ in color (as in this paragraph), which is not commented on separately. Blessed Augustine. Creations. – Volume 3–4. – St. Petersburg: Aletheya, 1998. Preparation of the text for publication by S. I. Eremeeva. Online text cites Harvest and AST (2000). Works of Blessed Augustine, Bishop of Hippo. – Second edition. – Parts 3–6. – Kyiv, 1905–1910. // Reprint from the publishing house of the Spaso-Preobrazhensky Valaam Monastery, 1994. The publishing house "Aletheia" writes about the text of this edition: "...translations of the Kyiv Theological Academy of the early 20th century, carried out by professors of the Academy with great textual care and with excellent knowledge of the church and theological realities of early Christianity." The publisher does not explain the need for a new edition. You might be interested in: